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I've begun servicing Saber I UHFs with a motorola battery eliminator, so now I can see the radios LCD display since it's powered up outside the housing. I came across one radio with an intermittent TX noise problem, put it in the battery eliminator, tried to TX, and the radio TXed for a split second before displaying "ERR 0 81" and freezing there until i power cycled. The low battery icon is also displayed along with the error code. Motorola tech support was no help here...they had no list of error codes aside from POST codes. I suspect this error 81 had to do with supply current, because I was running a 4A max supply at 7.5V. But I'm more interested in finding a list of all possible runtime error codes like this error 81. Motorola can't help...can anybody here?

Hello, although I am not am expert with these radios like Elroy, I believe the err 0 81 means there is a corrupt codeplug, or a checksum error somewhere. You often get this code if the radio is programed with too fast a computer, or there is an interuption during the writing phase of the programing cycle. I would say try reading and writing the radio with a slow computer(non-pentium class at least) and it should work. Hope this was of help.

On 2001-10-13 14:05, Gman wrote:Hello, although I am not am expert with these radios like Elroy, I believe the err 0 81 means there is a corrupt codeplug, or a checksum error somewhere. You often get this code if the radio is programed with too fast a computer, or there is an interuption during the writing phase of the programing cycle. I would say try reading and writing the radio with a slow computer(non-pentium class at least) and it should work. Hope this was of help.

you're most likely thinking about the error 81 that can occur during a power on self test. the motorola tech i spoke to could only come up with that code also. this error 0 81 something different, seeing how it only occurs when the radio transmits. this radio operates perfectly fine (aside from intermittent TX noise) when in its housing and running from a battery. so most likely, when i go to work monday and run from a supply that can output out more than 4A, the error will clear. but i'm wanting to know what other runtime (not POST) error codes can occur because i imagine there must be more than just this error 0 81.

Many times a Radio like the saber can
still work with a Error....Pretty much
like a Computer operating system. It means
that " All " fuctions may not be availible
or has been programmed ( or has a hardware )
problem preventing the radio from working properly.

If you can, just try and " Reprogram " the radio for its Model series, and see if that
restores the problem.

update: like i've already said, the error 81 i was experiencing is *not* the power-on checksum error everyone is telling me about. remember this radio works when it's in the case, and the error shows up when it's in the battery eliminator. i powered it up today with a supply that could output more than 4 amps, and sure enough, the error cleared. i know the service manuals list power-on error codes, and one of them is some sort of "81" code, but this is a different run-time type error. looks like 81 means "low current." i'm still interested in any other such undocumented (as far as i can tell) error codes like this, because it's probably just a matter of time before i see another.